RUSLAN RUSSIAN 2

A second level communicative Russian course

by John Langran and Natalya Veshnyeva

Ruslan Limited
www.ruslan.co.uk

Acknowledgements
Thanks to Nigel Evans, David Harmer, Jonathan Madden, Hkan Olson, Vivienne Simkins,
Steven Wilson, Wikipedia, www.mosmetro.ru, and others for their photographs, and to
the Institute of Linguists for their past examination material. Thanks to Tanya Aleksandrova,
Stanislav Chernishov, Katie Costello, David Knowles, Sergey Kozlov, Mikhail Kukushkin,
Tanya Lipatova, Tanya Nousinova, Mats Nystrom, Stella Sevander, Aleksey Yakubovich
and others for their suggestions, comments and help.
Thanks to John Albasiny, Natela Atkins, Larissa Belotsvetova, Igor Bunakov, Galina
Chirikova, Alex Chubarov, Sergey Kozlov, Mikhail Kukushkin, Anna Kurchenko, Natasha
Lewis and Nikolai and Zhenya Lipatov for their recordings, to Dan Wiener and Maria
Thorgevsky for the use of two of their songs, and to Brian Savin for the audio production
of the dialogues.
First published 1996
Second edition 2000
Third edition 2007
1996, 2000, 2007 Ruslan
Copyright for the cartoons - Anna Lauchlan

ISBN 1-899785-48-5
Copyright notice
Teachers using the Ruslan course with learners who have purchased the
course book may copy and cut out the speaking exercise material to use
as cue cards for group work and may copy the cartoons at the beginning
of each lesson for classroom use. With these exceptions, no part of this
book may be copied, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any
form or by any means, without the written permission of the copyright
owner. Ruslan Limited does not subscribe to the Publishers Licensing
Agreement.
Errata
Any errors or amendments will be listed on the Ruslan website at:
www.ruslan.co.uk/errata.htm

Accompanying materials
ISBN 1-899785-49-3
Ruslan 2 Audio CD. Recordings of dialogues and texts.
ISBN 1-899785-23-X
Ruslan 2 Student Workbook with free audio CD.
ISBN 1-899785-10-8
Ruslan 2 CD-ROM. Complete interactive version of the
Ruslan 2 course.
For Dutch, French, Swedish and other language versions see the website.
Ruslan Russian 1 - a first level course for beginners.
Ruslan Russian 3 - an advanced course to AS and A2 levels.
Ruslan Limited - www.ruslan.co.uk

INTRODUCTION
Ruslan Russian 2 is for learners of Russian who have completed a beginners course,
and takes you to a very good GCSE level and beyond. Ruslan 2 continues the
storyline of Ruslan 1, and builds on the content. The context is modern and
communicative, with a concise, systematic approach to the grammar. Ruslan 2 can
be used with groups with a teacher, or for individual learning, and for this the
CDRom is particularly useful. Here are some screens from the Ruslan 2 CDRom:

There is an Audio CD with recordings of the dialogues and most of the texts, and an
optional Student Workbook, with 150 additional exercises and a free Audio CD.
The ten lessons in this book include:
- a summary of the content of each lesson;
- a cartoon to introduce the theme;
- dialogues to introduce the new vocabulary and structures. The dialogues
follow the aventures of Ivan, Vadim, Lyudmila and their Moscow friends, and
the typical foreigner who has all sorts of problems with life in Russia!
- vocabularies with the new words;
- background information in Russian for each lesson;
- grammatical explanations;
- exercises based on the new material, reading exercises, listening and
writing exercises, exercises to practise the spoken language, role plays and
language games.
At the end of the book you will find a Key to the Exercises, the texts of the
Listening Exercise dialogues, a Grammar Review, and a Russian to English dictionary
for Ruslan 1 and Ruslan 2.

Internet support, with supplementary material, answers to student queries,

factual updates, additional explanations, and links to other useful sites, will be
available on the Ruslan website at: www.ruslan.co.uk/ruslan2.htm

CONTENTS

Pronunciation and stress in Russian
Note for teachers and learners

6
7
7

1 -
Talking about family and friends.
The accusative singular of adjectives.
The nominative and accusative plural of adjectives.
The instrumental with , etc.
Talking about your age.
Information: . .
Reading passage: -.
... .
... .

2 -
20
Using a Russian post office. Changing money.
Introduction to verb aspects - perfective and imperfective.
Plural of nouns and pronouns - dative, instrumental and prepositional.
Ordinal numbers.
Information: . . .
Reading exercise: : .
3 -
Talking about the weather.
Comparative adjectives and adverbs.
Numbers in the genitive case.
Information: : . .
Reading passage: .

32

4 - ?
Making arrangements to meet and go out.
Future tenses, perfective and imperfective.
Months of the year.
Genitive singular of adjectives.
Telling the time - minutes to and past the hour.
Information: . .
Reading passage: .

44

5 -
Going to the doctor's.
Parts of the body.
The genitive, dative and instrumental singular of feminine adjectives.
The dative singular of masculine adjectives.
Information: . . .
Reading passage: ?

56

Song - , , !

67

 6 -
Going shopping. Colours and sizes.
The prepositional singular of masculine adjectives.
Superlative adjectives.
Information: . ? .
Listening exercise: .
Reading passage: .

68

7 -
Travelling by train.
Introduction to verbs of motion.
The use of - "which".
The genitive plural of adjectives.
Information: . .
Reading passage: .

82

8 -
Talking about work and leisure.
More verbs of motion.
The conditional mood.
The animate accusative.
Information: .
Reading exercise: ?

96

9 - ?
Describing people and objects.
Personal pronouns and .
The possessive pronoun .
Negatives , and .
The use of and .
Information: .
Reading passage: .

108

10 -
Air travel. Expressing the date.
General revision.
Prepositions that take the instrumental case.
Information: . .
Reading passage: .

120

132

137

Review of Russian grammar

140

144

160

Internet support

www.ruslan.co.uk/ruslan2.htm

:
0

1000.

PRONUNCIATION AND STRESS IN RUSSIAN

Russian pronunciation depends on the stress. In words of more than one
syllable there is normally one stressed vowel which is pronounced more
strongly than the others. The stress is marked with an acute accent. For
example: .
Stress marks are only used in texts for learners. You will not have them to help
you in Russian newspapers, books or street signs.
For an example of how stress affects pronunciation, consider the stressed and
unstressed letter . In the word - wine , the is stressed and is given
its full value. But in the word - problem, the is unstressed and
therefore reduced. It sounds more like the English a in dad.
The stress in Russian isnt regular or predictable. There are a few useful rules
(page 142), but usually you have to learn the stress for new words as you meet
them.
Once you know the stress, the pronunciation of a Russian word can be worked
out from the spelling. There are very few exceptions to the basic pronunciation
rules. To improve your pronunciation, listen to the CD or work with the CDRom,
repeating the words and phrases as often as you can.
Dialogues marked
track.

are recorded on the audio CD. The number is the number of the CD

NOTE FOR TEACHERS AND LEARNERS

Ruslan Limited keeps a list of teachers using the Ruslan course, and uses it to
help learners find a local teacher. Teachers wanting to join the list and learners
looking for a teacher should email info@ruslan.co.uk.

..

Zoya Petrovna shows Ivan her family album. Ivan wants to see a photo of
Lyudmila. Zoya Petrovna is interested in Ivan and his family.
Lyudmila and Vadim arrive. Peter telephones to speak to Lyudmila, but she
doesnt want to speak to him. She wants to listen to a song on the radio
about a roast chicken that gets loose on Nevsky Prospekt....
In this lesson you will:
K
meet words you need when talking about your family and friends;
K
learn how to use adjectives in the accusative singular;
K
learn how to use adjectives in the nominative and accusative plural;
K
talk about peoples age and about getting married;
K
learn how to use the instrumental case after the verbs to be,
to work as, to be interested in etc.;
K
learn the future tense of - to be.
By the end of the lesson you should be able to talk about your friends and
family, their ages, interests and work.
There are information items on the popular drink , and on military
service - . The reading passage is about Saint
Petersburg - -, and there is an excerpt from Pushkins
poem (The Bronze Horseman) and a short note
about Pushkin himself.
The student workbook contains 19 additional exercises for this lesson, including a
conversation with Oksana about music and with Yulia about her studies and her family,
and a text about the early life of V.I. Lenin. The version of this lesson on the Ruslan 2
CDRom contains 29 interactive exercises with sound.

2

3

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10


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a
cp
/
16 e
ap / ooo
ca

/
p / ep
a

oop

ac / -

epecoc
/ -

family (adj.)
album
so; such
old
to receive
16 years
to give (a present)
young
wedding
quite
to get married
(for a woman)

to die
ago
uncle
father
long ago
grandfather
photo
jolly
sportsman
sport
to spend time
doing something;
to occupy oneself
with
to be interested in

In Ruslan 2 most verbs are listed in their

aspect pairs, imperfective and perfective.
For an explanation see lesson 2.

poc (perf.)
peo
e
c / p
ae / oe
po
/ a
e (+ gen.)
ac
xoo
poa / oa
/ -
c
o
pe
ca / ooc
ap
p
e
a

5

to show
Show (me)!
mother
children
to be born
child
married (for a woman)
to serve
army
to dance
to sing
difficult
to find
without
kvas
fridge
to try
why; what for
to turn on
song
chicken
roasted
to listen to
news
folk (adj.)
friend (m.)
will be
at home

:
www.ruslan.co.uk/ruslan2.htm

11

.
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: " ?".

6

(2006 ),
18 27

. , .
, ,
,

.
2006
,
2008
12 .

.

. .
,

, :
www.ruslan.co.uk/ruslan2.htm

12

! - Show me that photo!

agrees with the noun that it qualifies.
Masculine
Neuter
Feminine
Nominative singular

Accusative singular

! - Look at this beautiful woman!

In the accusative case feminine singular adjectives have the ending - :
?
What music do you like?
. I love classical music.
?
Have you read this new book?
- She got married
Words for getting and being married are different for men and women:
For a woman: to get married
/
she got married
*
she is married

For a man
to get married
/
he got married
*
he is married

For both, use the masculine form!
*,
* For a note on the use of aspects here
see www.ruslan.co.uk/ruslan2.htm

- beautiful children
Adjective plural endings are the same for all genders. The nominative plural
endings are - and -:

- the White Nights
- young soldiers
- Russian money
- sixteen years
When counting years above four, do not use the genitive plural - .
Instead use - of summers:

/ /
/
? - How old is Vadim?
To express ages, use the dative case:



- fathers brother
Many nouns have a fleeting or e which is lost when the ending changes.
Here loses its e and loses its .
- father
- child
- of father
- of the child

13

 - This is my uncle
Some masculine nouns and most male diminutive names have feminine
endings. Adjectives and pronouns agreeing with them stay in the masculine.
Some teachers call these transvestite nouns.
/
The word - a child - has the plural form - children.
- They were born in Leningrad
In the past tense, reflexive verbs use regular past tense endings plus the
suffix - (or - after a vowel). There may be stress changes:
Masculine singular:
/ /
Feminine singular:
/ /
Plural:
/ /
? - Was he a sportsman?
The instrumental case is used with - to be in the past and future, and
with - to work (in the sense to work as):
.
He was a sportsman.
.
He worked as an engineer.
.
I work as a teacher.
With in the past, use the nominative for a permanent state:
.
It was Sergeys brother.
- He is interested in the theatre
- He took part in sport
The verbs - to be interested in - and - to take
part in / to occupy oneself with are followed by the instrumental.
? - What does she do?
is the instrumental of . See page 140 for the declension of - what,
and - who.
/ - to die
This is irregular in the first person singular of the past perfective tense:
- he died
- she died
- they died
- to sing
, , / , , ,
- to dance
Most verbs with infinitives in - or - have a present tense stem in -:
, , / , ,
,
, , / ...
- She is without work
The preposition takes the genitive case:
- without sugar
- without me
14

 - She will be at home

This is the future tense of - to be:
, , / , , ,

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15

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18

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I love you, creation of Peter, I love

your stern, elegant view, the majestic
flow of the Neva, her granite bank,
the iron pattern of your railings, the
transparent twilight, the moonless
glow of your pensive nights, when in
my room I am writing, reading
without a lamp, and the sleeping
buildings of your desolate streets
are clearly visible, and the Admiralty
spire is lit up, ...
And without letting the dark of the
night on to the golden skies,
one dawn hurries to relieve the other,
giving half an hour to the night.
The full recording, text and translation of this
epic poem is available from Ruslan Limited
either as an audio CD or as an interactive
CDRom. www.ruslan.co.uk/advanced.htm

.
1799
.
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.



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9

1837 .

19

10

ANSWERS

The Alphabet
Ex. 1 See Ruslan 1 book pps. 5,6. Words not listed are international.
Ex. 2 , , , .
Ex. 3 , , , , .
Ex. 4 , , , , , .
Ex. 5 , , , , , .
Ex. 6 , , , , , , .
Ex. 7 , , , , .
Ex. 8 , , , , , , .
Ex. 9 , , , , , , , ,
, , .
Ex. 10 , , , , , , , .
Ex. 11 , , , , , , .
Ex. 12 , , , , , , , .
Ex. 13 , , , , , , .
Ex. 14 Audio and Video Cassettes, Cds. Wine. Football. Armenia. Cinema. Dmitrov. Cement.
Anna Karenina. Saratov.
Ex. 15 , , , , , ,
, , .
Lesson 1
Ex. 1, 2 See Ruslan 1 book p. 10. Words not listed are international.
Ex. 3 , , , , , ,
Ex. 4 Masculine: , , , , , , , , ,
. The others are feminine.
Ex. 5,6 Teacher marking required.
Ex. 7 - - - - - !
Ex. 8 - - - - !
Ex. 9 Director, container, conference, credit, courier, mafia, office, printer, seminar, telephone, firm,
company, contract, computer, xerox (photocopy), lift, marketing, partner, a safe, telex, fax,
photocopy.
Ex. 10 . . .
Ex. 11 . . .
Ex. 12 - ? - .
- ? - .
- ? - .
- ? - .
Ex. 13 administrator, businessperson, guitarist, director, journalist, engineer, consultant, cosmonaut,
linguist, mathematician, manager, mechanic, musician, pensioner, programmer, professor,
secretary (fem.), soldier, student, stewardess, farmer, physicist, footballer, economist.
Ex. 14 . . / . . .
.
Ex. 15 . . .
Ex. 16 in order: , , , , .
Ex. 17 in order: ,
Ex. 18 : , , . : , , .

20

Ruslan Russian 1 Workbook. Answers.